


None of this Meant-To-Be Crap

by whichstiel



Series: Season 14 Codas [6]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Byzantium, Episode Tag, Episode: s14e08 Byzantium, First Kiss, Fix-it fic, M/M, Profound Bond, Resurrection, The Empty, episode coda, spn 14x08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-07
Updated: 2018-12-07
Packaged: 2019-09-13 19:36:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16898667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whichstiel/pseuds/whichstiel
Summary: Castiel and Dean finally express their love for each other, only for Castiel to be ripped away by the Shadow from the Empty.Dean braves the Empty to rescue Castiel. A happy ending fix-it kind of story.





	None of this Meant-To-Be Crap

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Woollycas](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woollycas/gifts).



It was two weeks after they finished scrubbing the char marks from Michael’s wings off the bunker’s marbled floors when Dean finally lost the hollow look in his eyes. He greeted Castiel one morning with a jaunty whistle and a friendly clap on the shoulder, bending low to inhale the fragrant aroma of Castiel’s cup of coffee. 

Castiel offered a tentative smile and shifted back on his stool to indicate that there was plenty of room at the table. He watched Dean swivel jauntily towards the coffee maker, lips still pursed in a whistle. Dean poured himself a cup of strong black coffee and settled on the stool next to Castiel. Their shoulders touched as Dean shifted, the better to hunch vulture-like over his mug. Dean took a long sip and let out a gusty exhale of satisfaction. 

“Did you sleep well?” Castiel asked with some hesitation. He was accustomed to Dean’s typical morning antics of scowling, barking at the merest whisper, and angrily re-adjusting his robe. This sudden cheeriness was worrisome.

“Not at first,” Dean admitted after another noisy slurp. “Had some trouble. A lot on my mind, I guess. But...I think I figured out some things. Slept like a bear after that.” 

“I’m glad to hear it.” 

Dean knocked his shoulder with his own. “How ‘bout you? This is a little late for you to be hanging around the kitchen.”

 _I was waiting for you,_ seemed like too much pressure to lay on Dean, so instead Castiel said, “I was thinking as well.” He traced the curve of the handle of his mug. “I’ve found that one is seldom disturbed from one’s thoughts with a cup of coffee in hand.” 

Dean frowned, clearly thinking this over, then nodded. “What about?”

“Sorry?” Castiel had been cataloging the lines in Dean’s face, gauging whether any had deepened overnight; checking for the aftereffects of anguish or exhaustion.

“What were you thinking about?”

“The well-being of those in the bunker,” Castiel said, mostly truthfully. “And thinking that hunts have been sparse lately.”

“Yeah, well. Monsters are still laying low after that whole ‘final battle’ thing. It’s only a matter of time before they start up again. I’ve seen it before.” Dean sounded almost cheerful at the certainty of oncoming peril. Once again, Castiel thought he would have done well helming an ancient army. Battle was in his blood as surely as Castiel was molded with a blade in his own hand. Dean took another sip, slower this time and spun his mug in lazy half circles after he set it down. His shoulders relaxed as he contemplated his coffee and the soft flannels of his shirt pressed against Castiel’s coat. “We should do something today,” Dean said abruptly. 

Castiel nodded slowly. “Bobby was complaining about how we were running low on toilet paper.” He frowned. “He’s very sensitive about that. We still have twenty-four rolls left in the storage closet.”

Dean laughed. “Toilet paper’s like gold,” he said and for a moment he looked very far away. Then he shook himself. “We should go for a drive. Somewhere fun. Bobby can go to the store. Buy a whole damn fort of t.p.”

“Okay,” Castiel said agreeably. “Did you have someplace in mind? I think Sam’s working on tracking with Jack. They may be in the woods for a few more hours but then--”

“Nah,” Dean said easily. “Let’s you and me go. We’ll catch up with ‘em later.”

And so they drove, Castiel in the passenger seat of the Impala and the mid-morning sun streaming in, warming the layers of clothing on the arm he propped on the open window. While Lebanon was surrounded with a mish-mash of towns and larger cities, there were routes you could take to stay in the country. They did so.

In late spring, there was less heavy farm equipment clogging the roads. This meant that Dean could open up the throttle on Baby this morning. Together, they streaked over rolling hills, the wind curving into their open windows and the music turned up loud enough to be heard over the buffeting air. Driving like this felt like meditation, with the wind wrapping around them and their limbs resting loose and lazy against the sun-warmed leather of the Impala. 

Dean drove towards the Flint Hills, which extended like an ancient spine along the eastern edge of the state. The rolling hills on the edge of the Ozarks were bastions for wildlife, speckled with ancient prairie and grizzled oak woodlands. An hour north of Wichita, Dean pulled over at a roadside sign advertising an early settler family, and parked the Impala under the low, sweeping branches of an oak. “Gonna take a piss. Stretch my legs,” he explained, and then disappeared along the little winding trail. 

When he returned, Castiel was settled against the door of the Impala, arms and legs crossed and head tilted up towards the warm sunlight. His eyes were closed against the sun, so he heard, rather than saw Dean approach. “It is very beautiful here,” he murmured. Birdsong filled the air; the insect hum in the lush tall grass was a steady score underneath. There was no response and he opened his eyes to see Dean standing just feet away, his hands shoved into his pockets. He had a strange look in his eye, soft and contemplative, as he stared at Castiel. 

When Dean realized Castiel was staring at him in return, he grinned slowly. “Very beautiful,” he agreed. He jerked his chin back over his shoulder. “C’mon. Wanna show you something.”

Curious more about Dean’s sudden inclination to apparently go on a hike than what might lay beyond the trees, Castiel followed. 

The little trail they followed ran along the edge of a steep slope. Fieldstone jutted from the ground and the young grasses were already tall enough to knock into their knees. Just around the edge of the little hill, the landscape transitioned into dappled savannah. Dean stopped here, settling on a downed tree branch as large as his waist. He drew up a leg to prop it on the branch and slapped the bark next to him. “Have a seat, Cas.” 

Castiel settled next to him, more curious than ever. The view was beautiful, yes. But not the kind of spectacular vista Dean tended to favor. Dean sighed as Castiel relaxed on the log, stretching his long legs out for balance and propping his hands behind him. 

“So,” Dean said after a long silence between them filled with nothing but rippling leaves and birdsong. “I told you I was thinking a lot last night.” He stared out towards the trees, a new tension in the way he held himself. 

_He’s nervous,_ Castiel thought, and like an infection, worried flutters spread to his gut as well. He suddenly viewed the drive to someplace quiet and out of the way as warning signs. Dean was gearing up for something. Some pronouncement. Castiel sorted through the possibilities desperately. Were their lives threatened by some outside force? Did this have something to do with Heaven? Or Jack? Was Jack dying again, the story of Sam teaching him how to track just a coy cover-up? They were hours from the bunker now. Castiel’s breath caught in his throat like a knife and he knew the question came out strangled when he asked, “What is it, Dean?”

Dean picked up on his tone, because he looked over at Castiel and his eyes widened. “Dude,” he said, laying one hand on Castiel’s knee. “Nothing bad.” He gripped Castiel’s leg tightly for moment before he seemed to recognize the touch, and removed his hand. Castiel missed it immediately. Dean had been doing a lot of that lately - quiet, grounding touches before snatching them away like an errant child.

“It’s just...I’ve been thinking. About you.” The admission was quiet and...fond. “I know we’ve been friends for years now.” Dean gulped. “I want you to know that I treasure that, okay? You’re one of the best things in my life.”

Castiel smiled. “I can say the same about you,” he admitted, and the utterance felt like he was finally releasing a menagerie of birds that he’d kept caged in his chest. 

“Okay, but. Buddy,” Dean rolled his eyes and flexed his fingers on his thighs. “Cas. I’m trying to tell you—“ He settled back, hitching his leg so he sat almost sideways on the log. Castiel turned so they could meet each other’s gaze and found he could not look away from the fire he saw there. The surrounding prairie melted away until there was nothing but the sound of their breathing, both a little too fast. “I need you, Cas,” Dean said. “People are always telling me I gotta use my words, so I’m using ‘em now. I need you.” He reached out and wrapped one hand around Castiel’s arm, dragging it up so their hands wrapped around each other, held mid-chest between them. “I love you.”

“I—“ Castiel’s voice cracked and he cleared his throat and tried again, small against the yawning emotion expanding from Dean. “I love you too.”

Dean’s grin flashed for an instant, bright as the sun. “Okay, but...you gotta know.” He shook his head. “Man, it’s okay if you don’t feel the same way. I still— We can still be friends. Just...don’t leave because of this, okay?” 

“Of course,” Castiel said, utterly confused. “Never.”

“I’m _in_ love with you, Cas.” Dean said gently. “I wake up in the morning and want to touch you. I go to bed at night and—“ he shuddered a little. “Want to touch myself. I am completely totally, stuck-in-a-pit in love. And I—I pushed it down for so long. It was never the right time and you didn’t deserve, you know, me. But I’m tired of saying no.” He released Castiel’s hand and gently laid it on the flap of his coat splayed along the bark. 

“Is that what kept you up last night?” Castiel asked, wonderingly. He felt light-headed with surprise, or maybe just light. HIs heart hammered in his chest, unrepentant. 

“Yeah,” Dean admitted. “Just wanted to go for it, you know?” He laughed and released Castiel’s hand. “Been driving around trying to figure out how to say it. You got no idea how many times I almost chickened out. People are always telling me to use my words, right? But—“ Dean looked seriously at Castiel. “Now you know.”

“I’m glad, Dean,” Castiel said, thinking that words were so utterly imperfect to convey the wellspring of emotion within him. He took up Dean’s hand and mirrored his earlier action, pressing their joined hands to his own chest. “I feel the same way.”

Tension seemed to break away from Dean with Castiel’s words and he grinned, broad and confident. “Awesome,” he breathed, and the word sounded like a prayer. He pursed his lips then ran his tongue between them, swaying forward incrementally. “Can I— Can we— Can I kiss you, Cas?”

Castiel answered him by threading his fingers through the hair at the nape of Dean’s neck and pulling him in greedily. He’d been starving for this for so long. These further steps into intimacy, the assuage of longing - Castiel tried to press everything he was feeling into the kiss, thrilled when Dean’s mouth opened beneath his. Thrilled when their tongues met, warm and perfect. The sunshine dappled their shoulders, streaming through the spaces between the leaves. 

They kissed as the sun marched to its zenith, and Castiel burned with joy.

* * *

The Empty returned for Castiel sixty-five days after Dean told him that he loved him. They were en route to a hunt, and stopped at a sleepy roadside stand in the rain shadow of the Rockies. The day was dry and bright and a light breeze scraped the ground into dusty swirls. They sat on the picnic table, boots propped on the benches and ate their hamburgers in companionable silence. Jack eagerly soaked in the scenery. Sam read lore on his phone. And Dean sat with his leg loosely pressed against Castiel, boot scraping the sides of Castiel’s shoe like footsie was a reasonable game to play while wearing bulky hiking boots. 

After their first kiss, Castiel couldn’t believe it. He woke every morning in Dean’s bed like it was the start of a new miracle, soon to be yanked away by some capricious god. But here, sitting on the bench with his family around him, Castiel finally allowed himself to believe he had carved a place for himself in the world, and in the heart of the man whom he loved most. “Good things do happen,” he murmured, and smiled around the french fry he was slowly nibbling.

His feet felt it first, suddenly numb like they’d lost all feeling, like the way he felt sometimes sleeping on buses or concrete underpasses when he was human. Castiel waggled his foot, stretching and rolling it mindlessly, when Dean began to swear. 

Castiel looked down immediately and saw something black spider its way liquidly over his sock and up the tailored hem of his pants. He gasped in shock and tried to shake it away, even as the black climbed up his body. Even as the numbness spread. 

“What the hell is that?” Dean yelled and burgers were littered on the ground, french fries strewn like downed trees after an avalanche. And Dean was yelling and Jack was screaming _no no no no don’t take him_. 

Suddenly there was nothing but a hiss in his ear. A mad little cackle that said, “Gotcha, _Cas_.” His own nickname, delivered in a mocking inflection, was the last thing Castiel heard before darkness closed over his jaw and nose and eyes.

* * *

The thing about oblivion is that you’re oblivious to it. Castiel woke up to darkness like he’d only just shut his eyes, the echo of the Shadow still cackling in his ear. His chest burned and he curled in on himself, hands clenched around it, fingers tangling into his shirt and around his tie. Pain wracked his body. Still, the pain was at least _something_ , and it pushed Castiel to sit upright and look around. His heart sank.

He was in the Empty.

He was in the Empty, and he remembered everything now. The bargain - his life for Jack’s. It had seemed like a worthy trade at the time. Castiel probed at the memory. He thought about those perfect weeks with Dean, the adjustment towards a new kind of domesticity. “Are you there?” he shouted into the darkness. “Is this a test, or do you mean to mock me?” 

Painfully, he pushed himself to his feet, his chest throbbing. “I don’t regret it,” he ground out. “Jack should never be yours. You don’t deserve him.”

Castiel shouted into emptiness, and nothing came back to him, not even an echo. He began to stumble - forward or backward, did it even matter? He walked simply to walk and wondered that the Shadow didn’t seem inclined to show themself. The creature seemed to thrive off of mockery. His chest burned, more endurable now that he was on his feet. Soon, perhaps, the pain would become another part of him, familiar as any limb.

When he heard his name shouted, Castiel assumed it was a trick - the Shadow, mocking him from afar, tracing illusions into the nothingness. Castiel stopped, nevertheless, and swayed in agony at it. He could hear Dean shouting, tone tinged with desperation. He was shouting for him. _CASTIEL_!

“Leave me alone,” Castiel whispered, but the voice continued. “Leave me alone!” he shouted, snapping. Castiel winced after that. He’d lost a battle, he thought, just by speaking too loudly. Losing control. It was too soon for small defeats. 

The distant voice changed. “Cas?” There was an edge now of hysterical hope to it. “Cas! Keep talking. I’m coming to find you. Cas! Keep talking!”

The voice didn’t sound maddened, or aggressive. It sounded like splintered hope - like Dean. Castiel threw his worries to the ground and began to yell back in earnest. As Dean’s voice grew nearer, the pain in Castiel’s chest began to subside. He pressed a hand against his shirt in wonder, then began to run. 

The way the Empty worked, there was nothing until suddenly, there was something. Dean drew into view out of nowhere, his eyes wide against the darkness. When he saw Castiel, there were no words. Nothing could have been more powerful than the burning look on his face - relief, despair, fear, love. 

Castiel closed his arms around Dean and buried his chin against his ear. “Is it you?” he asked, not ashamed to hear the tremble in his voice. 

“Yeah, man. It’s me,” Dean said, thick with emotion. “I found you,” he said, and held Castiel in a vice-like embrace. “I found you.”

At long last (because time was hard to track in the Empty) Castiel pulled away and held Dean at arm’s length, loathe to let go of him completely. “But-- But what are you doing here? Dean. You can’t mean to stay. Did Billie send you--”

“Billie sent me,” Dean said quickly. “But not the way you think. I’m here to get you out.”

Castiel looked around; a fruitless gesture in the gathering nothingness. “How?” he breathed. 

“We just gotta--”

Dean was interrupted by the sound of slowly clapping hands. Castiel whirled around to see an image of himself looming near, mouth twisted in a smirk. “Oh goody,” the Shadow said. “Now I get a Winchester too.”

“Get away from us, Shadow,” Dean warned. He fumbled in his pocket for something and pulled out a slender, silver amulet. The cord tangled in his fingers, black against the surroundings, but the amulet seemed to gleam with its own light. He held it up like a warding.

The Shadow cocked their head to one side. “Interesting toy you’ve got there. Mind if I take it?” In a flash, the Shadow was at their side, fingers plucking the amulet from Dean’s hand and holding it aloft. 

“Dean?” Castiel asked, half question and half warning. Surely the Shadow had just seized the very thing they needed to stop it. But Dean seemed heartened by the sight of the amulet in the Shadows hands. 

“We’ve done a lot of research in the last couple of months,” Dean said casually. “Lotta summoning of gods and long talks with Death. And you know what? I know what you are now.”

“Oh, do you?” the Shadow sounded bored and twirled the amulet around two fingers. 

“I do,” Dean affirmed. “See, you thought you could keep Cas. Trap him. But he and I - we share a bond that you can’t break.” Dean fumbled for Castiel’s hand and held it up like it was an exhibit in a trial. “I knew I could find him.”

“And find him you did. Good little monkey,” the Shadow said with a bored tone that set Castiel’s teeth on edge. 

“Dean,” Castiel told him. “If you plan to do something, now is the time.” He could feel aggrieved power swelling in the being before them. “This place. This darkness? It’s the Shadow’s domain. I don’t think we can stand for long here.”

“I love Cas,” Dean said quietly to the Shadow. “I’d do anything for him and you can’t even begin to comprehend what kind of light that can bring to the darkest place. Even here.”

At this, the Shadow roared, eyes wide in maddened amusement. “Am I to be defeated by the power of _love_?” he chortled. “Someone as old and powerful as me?”

“No. You’re not so old as you let on,” Dean replied. “Oh, you like to loom and snarl and say you’re as old as time, but you existed _after_ the angels. See, this place was supposed to be paradise. A retreat for angels, carved out in its own cozy little dimension. But Lucifer turned into a dick when he got Amara’s mark. He tore it all down. All the beauty of the angel’s afterlife. He thought if he tore it apart, he’d send any angels he killed into oblivion. Nonexistence. See, he wanted that for his brother, the crazy bastard.”

Castiel stared at Dean in puzzlement. “What are you saying? I thought the Empty was...”

“Some kind of punishment for failure? Like it’s your fault you died? Yeah, yeah,” Dean said when Castiel nodded. “I heard that shit from Duma. But here’s the thing. We found ourselves a new prophet. Someone who could read the angel tablet. It told us everything. How the place the Empty is in was supposed to be paradise, an eternal reward for Chuck’s first children. How Lucifer tried to destroy it, and failed to do it completely because he’s a giant, useless fuck-up dick-bag.” Dean jabbed an accusatory finger at the Shadow. “You like to say you’re nothing. But that’s wrong.”

“I am the embodiment of nothing,” the Shadow spat. 

“But you’re not,” Castiel said as a candle flame of understanding ignited in his gut. “You’re _something_. And the Empty...it’s not empty at all. It’s full of life, just sleeping. This place...it’s full of angels and gods and who knows who else. This place is full of power. Of life.” He cocked his head to one side and read the answer on the Shadow’s enraged face. “And you know that. This is why you’ve been driven mad by us.”

“Cas is right,” Dean said. “This place is full of power. Just seething with it. You’re like...a byproduct of it. Like the angels are Elsa and you’re just this magic snowman—“ He broke off at Castiel’s and the Shadow’s twin looks of puzzlement. “Eh, never mind.” Dean nodded towards the amulet the Shadow held. “Look. I wanted you dead. I wanted to come up here and find a way to gank you. Me and Cas would’ve found our way back somehow. But Billie told me you’re not nothing and if you return to nothing, _boom_. There goes the universe. Something about dark matter and physics and I...didn’t really get all of it. But Sam had another plan. You better hold on to that amulet, because after what I’m gonna do...well, you’re gonna need it.”

In one swift movement Dean pulled open his layered shirts, revealing an expanse of skin marred by a carved rune. 

Castiel gasped. “The horn of Gabriel?”

Dean nodded and before the Shadow could move, before Castiel could think through the ramifications of it, Dean slapped his hand to his chest. The sigil on his chest began to glow the bright-white light of a human soul and Castiel heard the trumpet sound down to the very core of his grace. He would have woken to it, even if he were still in the deepest slumber of the Empty. “Wake up, bitches!” Dean crowed. “Rise and shine! Time to have an afterlife!”

“No!” The Shadow began shaking their head, backing away into the darkness. “You can’t do this! This isn’t how it’s meant to be!” They pressed their hands against their ears and cowered. “So much noise,” the Shadow complained. “So much light.” 

“You’re a Shadow,” Dean said dispassionately. “And light both diminishes and creates you. That’s what Billie said, anyway. And guess what? I just pulled down a fuckton around your shoulders. Now, you got two choices. One, you can try to fight every last damn one of the angels waking up. Or two, you can go the fuck to sleep. That amulet...put it on and you won’t hear a damn thing. Cosmic earmuffs. The choices we make determine our fate,” Dean said, with the air of someone who’s heard that maxim repeated one too many times. “What’s your choice gonna be? ‘Cause I’m gonna tell you right now. Even if you kick me out. Even if you kick both of us out...in a year, or centuries or aeons from now, Cas might end up here again. And when he does, you bet your fucking ass I’m gonna be packing my little soul bag and moving in. And nobody makes life hell like a Winchester. You get me?”

The Shadow shot an enraged look at Dean, and Castiel readied himself to fight to defend him. But the pain of the apparent din of angels was too much. The Shadow collapsed into a heap, face losing features, trench coat melting in and out of black ooze. Finally, it gripped the amulet and placed it around what could reasonably still be called a head and neck. Instantly, it took form again and this time Castiel found himself looking at a reflection of himself with his features smoothed in peace. “Oh,” the Shadow said. “Oh my. That’s...much better. I can’t...I can’t hear a thing. Or feel a thing. Or taste--” Black ooze erupted from it again, folding over itself and over the amulet and then, in a sudden sploosh, it disappeared into the darkness.

“Dean, where has it gone?” Castiel felt for his blade.

“Hopefully for a nice long eternal bedtime,” Dean said. He wound his hands into the lapels of Castiel’s coat and pulled him close, the glorious warmth of his mouth like sunshine after the numb nothingness of before. 

“But Dean,” Castiel managed to say between kisses. “How will we get out? How will you get out?”

“There’s a door,” Dean said. “A pretty fucking custom door. Remember Purgatory? That door for human souls that no monster could pass through?”

Castiel nodded and pulled Dean closer, running his hands up behind Dean’s shirt, tracing the contours of muscles in his back. “Is there one like that here?”

“Not exactly.” Dean pulled back enough to fish something out of his other pocket. It was a small copper compass, engraved with ornate scrollwork. Dean flipped open the cover and held it out. “Jack’s holding it open for us. This compass will lead us to him.”

Castiel took hold of Dean’s hand, while Dean held the compass in his other palm. Together, they walked the dark spaces of the Empty, watching the compass point. As they walked, a rose-gold light seemed to glow from under their feet, shifting like the northern lights. 

“Is that the angels waking up?” Castiel asked, fighting a terrible urge to find his angelic family - so many lost -and haul them out with him.

“Fuck if I know,” Dean said. “Probably? Billie called it the ‘cosmic order falling back into place’ and told me not to pull a Winchester and fuck with it any more than I already am. So...onward.”

They walked and walked, tethered to each other by intertwined fingers. Finally, they saw a blue-white pinprick in the distance. 

“That’s it!” Dean shouted and tugged at Castiel’s hand, pulling them both forward into a run. As they ran, the blue light resolved into a doorway, a whirling portal of energy. Jack stood silhouetted in it, a broad grin on his face. 

“They have a door for nephilim,” Jack called excitedly. “Isn’t that cool?”

“It’s very cool,” Castiel assured him breathlessly. “But I’m not nephilim. And Dean is human. How do you intend to get through?” 

The tips of Dean’s ears turned red. “You know how you’re always saying shit like, ‘we share a profound bond?’”

“Yes,” Castiel said, eyes narrowed at Dean’s flippant description.

“Well,” Dean shrugged. “We’re joined. Angel and human souls bound together.”

“Like you’re soul married,” Jack supplied helpfully.

Dean groaned. “Sure, kid.”

“So we can…” Castiel tried not to let hope suffuse him. He had spent so long in the darkness. 

“Walk right on through. That door gets us to Heaven, which gets us to a portal to Earth and…”

“And we’re back home,” Castiel said with wonder.

“Yep.”

“And you did this. You...did all of this. For me?”

“I’d like to see anyone try to stop me from getting to you,” Dean said. “Now. It’s fucking cold here. Can we go?”

And so they went. Hunter and angel and nephilim who was both and neither at the same time. Behind them, as the door closed, the Empty diminished as light spread and the angels reclaimed their paradise.

A day later, Castiel reclined along the hood of the Impala, Dean’s warm fingers interwoven with his. They were sharing a beer, passing the lukewarm bottle back and forth under the starlight. “I’m glad you came for me,” Castiel said, feeling the inadequacy of words like a pang in his heart. The sky wheeled above them, full of the light of a million suns.

“I’ll always come for you, man.” Dean rose up on one shoulder and pressed a firm kiss to Castiel’s mouth. He tasted like beer and salt. He dipped his head to Castiel’s ear and whispered, very sweetly, “Now let’s see you come for me.” 

The stars were forgotten. The beer bottle toppled to the ground. Castiel pulled his lover into his arms and as they reveled in each other, Castiel finally understood the heady power of perfect joy.

**Author's Note:**

> I was going to end this unhappily but, hey, Woollycas... This one’s for you :)
> 
> Thanks for reading! I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/whichstiel) and [Tumblr](http://whichstiel.tumblr.com/) @ whichstiel. 
> 
> Rebloggable link: <https://whichstiel.tumblr.com/post/180902526925/none-of-this-meant-to-be-crap-whichstiel>


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